1911 Encyclopædia Britannica/Inn (river)

INN, a river of Europe, an important right bank tributary of the Danube. It rises at an elevation of 7800 ft., in a small lake under the Piz Longhino, in the Swiss canton of the Grisons. After flowing for a distance of 55 m., through the Engadine it leaves Swiss territory at Martinsbruck and enters Austria. It next plunges through the deep ravine of Finstermünz, and, continuing in the main a north-easterly direction, receives at Landeck the Rosanna. Hence its course becomes more rapid, until, after swirling through the narrow and romantic Oberinnthal, it enters the broader and pastoral Unterinnthal. It next passes Innsbruck and from Hall, a few miles lower down, begins to be navigable for barges. At Kufstein, down to which point it has still pursued a north-easterly direction, it breaks through the north Tirol limestone formation, and, now keeping a northerly course, enters at Rosenheim the Bavarian high plateau. Its bed is now broad, studded with islands and enclosed by high banks. Its chief tributaries on this last portion of its course are the Alz and the Salzach, and at Passau, 309 m. from its source, it joins the Danube, which river down to that point it equals in length and far exceeds in volume of water. Its rapid current does not permit of extensive navigation, but timber rafts are floated down from above Innsbruck.

See Greinz, Eine Wanderung durch das Unterinntal (Stuttgart, 1902).